I pick up and elaborate on some parts that were cut from my review of "The AI Does Not Hate You", including some riffing on mind dumps, weirdness, tensions between the rationalist community and polite society, my conservatism-free youth, the conservatism of Star Trek and my hopes for AI stagnation. Read more (17 min, 4300 words).
I review Tom Chivers's book The AI Does Not Hate You, about AI risk, the rationalist community and his own process finding out whether he agrees with them. I note that I wanted to hear more about the last part, mostly because of how similar to the author I seem to be. Read more (16 min, 3900 words).
Some reflections, comments and elaborations on my appearance on the Intellectual Explorers Club Podcast. Read more (9 min, 3200 words).
We feel there should be a clear answer to the question of whether some thing exists or not. I argue that often there isn't, because follwing our self-contradictory intuitions leads us to weird places. Instead we should interpret talk about what exists as talk about how we best represent the world. Read more (12 min, 3100 words)
I love philosophy but have plenty of frustrations with it. The use of words as if they had definite meanings is one, the unhealthy obsession with its own history is another. Ultimately I’d want philosophy to show its modern and relevant face more and be less about prescientific word-wrangling. Read more (16 min, 3900 words)
Doubting conventional wisdom doesn’t necessarily make you a conspiracy theorist - skepticism should be universal and not only applied to "legitimate targets". It’s not always irrational to not change your mind when confronted with a piece of contrary evidence, and it can sometimes even be justified to increase your confidence that you’re right. Read more (11 min, 2800 words)
How you can feel like you know people and be part of a group without actually being so. It describes me and the so-called "rationalist community".Read more (1500 words)
